#raatha

And it still never fails to make me laugh that my first impression of my future-to-be-wife was that her character’s name was Gwendolynii and I giggled at how desperate she must have been to get the name Gwendolyn if she was willing to go that far for it. I saw her at a group roleplay, as we were both big into roleplaying on GW2 at the time and she was part of a RP guild that I had a bit of interest in potentially joining. We didn’t speak at all, more than we just sort of saw each other in passing, and we didn’t even really roleplay with one another either.

Actually... funnier than how I remember how I first saw her is the fact I don’t really remember how I met her. I know that @raatha approached me first, and we joined a party, and there was an at-length discussion of how beautiful she thought my sylvari was. There might have been some talk of roleplay ideas on both our ends, things she was interested in doing and things I was interested in doing. It was fun, I just don’t remember that much of it. For the most part, a lot of our friendship initially revolved around roleplay, but as time progressed it branched outwards, too. What other games did we like that weren’t Guild Wars 2? Maybe we should play them some time!

Then, drama happened. Not between me and her, but between me and other folk. A lot of miscommunication and misunderstanding, a lot of very harsh words from both sides, and far more hurt feelings than was really necessary. It was actually a really, really dark time for me and it impacted my love of Guild Wars 2 really heavily. I had to move server to even feel brave enough to log in and play the game, and my motivation for doing anything inside the game was thoroughly trashed. I still love GW2, but to be honest, everything that happened back then (over three years ago now) still impacts the game for me a little. Guild Wars 2 was never quite the same. Raatha was one of the very few contacts from my GW2 life that stayed in touch with me, and I’m really glad that she did. Without turning this into too much of a sob story, Raatha offered very endearing and very comforting support as I tried to muddle through a really hard time for me, and I’m forever grateful for that. She really did help me see it through to the other side of that nasty place, and our friendship really only got stronger because of it. As I got back onto my feet again, we dabbled at doing things that weren’t related to Guild Wars 2. We continued to roleplay, just not in the game. The friendship just developed along with everything else that we were doing.

And then one day, while I’m in the middle of work, Raatha asks me straight out of the blue if I’d be interested in dating her. The rest is history~!

I don’t have the same relationship with Guild Wars 2 today that I did five years ago. I’ve grown a lot as a person and my life has changed pretty significantly over those years. I still enjoy the game, still log in from time to time and play it, and I still get excited about story patches or new armour pieces that look pretty, but the game isn’t quite as magical for me today as it used to be. But honestly... I’m okay with that. I’m okay with that, because everything that was magical about GW2 has been replaced by everything that’s magical about my fiancé instead. And even if I don’t play GW2 as much any more, and even if I never play it the way I used to, the bottom line is that I don’t play GW2 as much any more because I met so many amazing people playing it. My activity in the game today does not change the fact that the game’s community, the game’s design and the game’s open-minded attitude towards creating an MMORPG that encouraged players to communicate and help one another rather than forcing them to compete for mobs or drops or quest progress is the reason that I got to make so many amazing friends, have so many amazing memories, and eventually - to my great surprise - meet the person that I now hope to one day marry and spend the rest of my life with.

So... thanks, ArenaNet. I might bitterly complain about your design decisions sometimes, I might get frustrated with some of the microtransaction choices your company makes, and I might have ranted very often and very frequently about bugs, or intentional mechanics in game that just don’t work, or stupid story decisions, or poor character writing... But I kind of owe you one, too.